Mar 09 2008
French Local Council Elections
Today sees the local council elections in France in thousands of communes across the country. Communities will be voting for their local ‘maire’, but what’s interesting is that with the number of British expats now living in France, one ‘commune’ in Normandy has already had a British ‘maire’ for 13 years and in another community in the Dordogne, in the village of Eymet, 5 Brits have been nominated to stand for council elections. It’s nice to see that British expats are now integrating themselves into local communities and wanting to influence life in their new home.
This may all change though if Sarkozy has his way as he wants to abolish the many thousands of local communities from 36,000 to 6,000 ’super communes’. As you can imagine this isn’t going down very well with most communities. Sarkozy isn’t exactly a popular President and may well make things worse for himself! It’ll be interesting to see how life in France may change under the new President.
Having English “Conseillers Municipaux” is an excellent thing. Low-cost flights and TV shows have inspired a massive wave of British expats to France over the recent years. Often younger and with smaller budgets than the Francophiles who arrived 20 years ago, many come with business ideas, and their children go to French schools. It is perfectly normal that they take part in local French elections
Hello Fabien, I totally agree and think it’s a good think that when people relocate they actively participate within their new community. If British ex-pats (or ex-pats from any country) can bring new ideas and start new businesses then it can encourage others to do the same.